Wyoming HOA Laws: What Homeowners Need to Know in 2026
Wyoming has no homeowners’ association act. A subdivision association runs on its recorded covenants, plus the Wyoming Nonprofit Corporation Act (W.S. 17-19) if it is incorporated. Condominiums get a four-section Condominium Ownership Act (W.S. 34-20). No statute sets dues, lien priority or a resale certificate, so the declaration decides them.
What the 2026 Wyoming Statutes actually say about associations
Title 34 (Property, Conveyances and Security Transactions) has 30 chapters; chapter 20, “Condominium Ownership,” is the only one aimed at a type of community. Across all 41 titles of the legislature’s compilation dated May 8, 2026, homeowners’ or owners’ associations come up in just four places: two county subdivision-permit provisions (W.S. 18-5-306 and 18-5-316), the private transfer fee chapter (W.S. 34-28-101), and a definition in the Uniform Mortgage Modification Act (W.S. 34-30-102) that keeps security for association dues outside the word “mortgage.”
That leaves the recorded declaration to settle how assessments are set, whether unpaid dues become a lien and how it is enforced, whether fines need a hearing, and what a seller hands over. The county clerk keeps the recorded copy; read it before you sign.
| Community | Law on top of the declaration | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Condominium (air-space units under a recorded declaration) | Condominium Ownership Act, four sections | W.S. 34-20-101 to -104 |
| Subdivision association organized as a Wyoming nonprofit corporation | Nonprofit Corporation Act: meetings, records, financial statements | W.S. 17-19 |
| Any property subject to a covenant | Child-care use rule; removal of unlawful covenants; transfer fee limits | W.S. 34-1-501, 34-1-154 to -156, 34-28 |
The Condominium Ownership Act in four sections
W.S. 34-20-102 treats a condominium as a separate fee simple estate in an “individual air space unit” plus an undivided interest in the common elements, inseparable while the declaration’s condominium period lasts. The declaration, with a map locating the units, is recorded with the county clerk (34-20-104(b)). The assessor taxes each unit as its own parcel, and a forfeiture or sale of one unit for delinquent taxes, mechanics’, laborers’ or materialmen’s liens, assessments or charges leaves the other units’ title untouched (34-20-104(a)).
For owners, 34-20-104(c) is the operative line: a declaration term requiring membership in an association, or payment of charges the association assesses on units, is one of the “covenants running with the land binding upon all condominium owners and their successors in interest.” Lien amounts, foreclosure, meetings and resale papers are not addressed.
Incorporated associations: meetings and books under W.S. 17-19
If your association is a Wyoming nonprofit corporation with members:
- Annual meeting. Required every year at the time the bylaws set, with a report from the president and chief financial officer on activities and finances (17-19-701).
- Notice. Must be “fair and reasonable”; notice of place, date and time sent 10 to 60 days ahead qualifies if an annual or regular meeting notice also describes any matter the Act requires members to approve and a special meeting notice describes the matters it is called for (17-19-705(c)).
- Special meeting. Holders of at least 5% of the voting power can demand one in writing. No notice within 30 days of delivery, and a signer may set the meeting and send notice (17-19-702).
- Records. Five business days’ written notice opens the 17-19-1601(e) set: articles, bylaws, board resolutions on members’ rights, three years of members’ meeting minutes, three years of written communications to members including financial statements, the list of directors and officers, and the latest annual report. Accounting records, excerpts of other minutes and action records, and the membership list need the same notice plus three conditions: good faith and a proper purpose, a reasonably particular description of purpose and records, and records directly connected with that purpose (17-19-1602(b)–(c)). Patient files, personnel matters, disciplinary files, individual member files, client files, medical files and “other files which are generally considered by law to be confidential or privileged” stay confidential (17-19-1602(f)).
- Costs. Copy charges may not exceed the estimated cost of production (17-19-1603(c)). A court that orders inspection also orders the corporation to pay the member’s costs and reasonable counsel fees, unless it proves a good-faith refusal with a reasonable basis to doubt the member’s right (17-19-1604(c)).
- Financial statements. The latest annual statements, on written demand (17-19-1620(a)).
Covenant statutes that reach every Wyoming association
Home child care. Since July 1, 2024 (2024 Wyo. Sess. Laws ch. 84), W.S. 34-1-501 makes a family day care home, care for not more than ten children on a regular basis, a residential use wherever the covenant does not “clearly and expressly prohibit child care.”
Unlawful covenants. Since July 1, 2021 (2021 Wyo. Sess. Laws ch. 70), an owner of record, or an attorney, title insurance company or title insurance agent acting for one, may record a new instrument striking a covenant that a final decision of the Wyoming Supreme Court or the U.S. Supreme Court has held void, or that violates W.S. 40-26-103 through 40-26-109 of the Wyoming Fair Housing Act (34-1-154). An owner burdened or benefited by the stricken covenant may petition the court; if it is found valid, the filer pays damages set by the court up to $1,000, or actual damages if greater, plus costs and reasonable attorneys’ fees (34-1-156).
Transfer fees. A private transfer fee obligation recorded or entered into on or after April 1, 2012 does not bind later owners (34-28-102). Amounts payable under a declaration, covenant or law to a homeowners’, condominium, cooperative, mobile home or property owners’ association, or to a nonprofit land trust, fall outside that definition (34-28-101(a)(ii)(H)), but the payee must record a notice with the county clerk stating the fee’s existence and amount, its type and nature, any penalty for nonpayment, the legal description, and its own name and address (34-28-103(a)).
Subdivisions approved by a county
Reviewing a subdivision permit, a board of county commissioners may require proof that every parcel will be bound by recorded covenants creating an entity, a homeowners association among the listed options, able to handle maintenance of common areas, roads and water systems, the assessments that pay for them, and its own continued management (W.S. 18-5-306(a)(xii)). The board “shall not mandate the creation of an entity with the ability to interfere with any owner’s ability to use his private property, except to collect any assessment.” By rule it may exempt a split into not more than five units.
Wyoming HOA questions, answered from the statutes
Can a Wyoming HOA foreclose over unpaid dues?
No statute grants or forbids it; any lien and any way of enforcing it must come from the recorded declaration. For condominiums, a sale of one unit for unpaid assessments cannot affect the other units’ title (34-20-104(a)).
How soon can I see the books?
In an association incorporated under W.S. 17-19, give written notice at least five business days before the date you want to look, and state a purpose for accounting records. The Unincorporated Nonprofit Association Act (W.S. 17-22-101 to -115) has no member-records section, so an unincorporated association’s documents control.
Must the seller give me a resale certificate?
No Wyoming statute requires one. Write a condition into your offer that the seller deliver the declaration, bylaws, rules, the current budget and a statement of unpaid assessments before your contingency deadline.
More for Wyoming: Wyoming housing hub, Wyoming homeowner insurance, selling a house in an HOA, HOA glossary entry, buyer’s guide. Statute text: Title 34 (PDF), Title 17 (PDF).